My Husband

There are times my husband drives me crazy. He doesn't clean up after himself very well, he ignores me so he can play video games and he usually doesn't notice household chores to be done. In other words, he's a normal man.

But then, sometimes, he does something that makes me forget (almost) all of those things and I remember why I fell in love with him in the first place. The last time this happened was Valentine's Day.

We aren't big V-Day people. We barely even notice the day as far as our romantic relationship is concerned. But now we have kids. And I grew up getting Valentines from my parents and I want to continue that tradition. If my kids are like me, they will spend many adult years receiving Valentines ONLY from their parents, which leads to an amazing amount of bittersweet tears...but I digress. Back to the present.

And speaking of presents. I forgot them this year. Well, I didn't actually, totally forget, but I procrastinated. If I buy them too early, there's a chance they will be found. So I waited. Until the day before Valentine's Day, when I realized my husband was out of town and not coming back until the following day and I would have no time without children to buy Valentines. Crap. I failed again.

So I call my husband and ask him to pick up a little something for each of the kids. Now, I have to say, he loves to buy gifts for the kids. I knew he wouldn't mind, but I couldn't imagine what he would bring home. Not that it wouldn't be great - the kids would love it - but it probably wouldn't be what I would have picked. (I'm kind of a control freak) I figured he'd come home with enough candy to put them into a diabetic coma and possibly a stuffed animal either too big to keep in the house or covered with enough lace and possibly gold to keep me up at night planning on how to get it out of the house without hurting any feelings. I should have trusted my husband more. What he brought far surpassed any of my lame expectations.

Here is what he brought the girls.

Sure, what you see here is no big deal to you. A fuzzy bag with pencils, a little candy (not overboard at all), and a rose that plays a little song. Cute, right? What's the big deal, right?

Ok, let's look at the next picture. Look at all the goodies in the bag. Tiny paints, tiny notebooks, pencils and pens that light up. A few pieces of candy, but just the right amount. Precious stuff, right? But still, anyone can buy a bag of junk, right? What's the big deal, right?

Here's the big deal:

I had assumed that he just bought the bags full of stuff, as is. They were so perfectly proportioned with fun junk with a little candy mixed in, I thought it had to be commercially done. And the rose sticking out when he carried them in looked like something you would see in a store.

Then he handed me a sack and said "Here's all the leftover stuff." There were spare candies, pencils, and paint sets. I said "Did you buy all this stuff separately?"

"Yeah," he said. "I can't believe it, Babe. You picked all of this out and put it all together?" I asked. "I love it. You did so great, Honey. It's absolutely perfect." I told him.

His response made my heart melt. "Well, I knew you were upset that you forgot, so I went in and tried to imagine what you would do for them. I tried to pick out things that you would like and I knew you wouldn't pick all candy. I just tried to think of what Momma would do."

Oh. My. God. If the kids weren't in the room right now........

Seriously, though. All I could do was give him a huge hug and a kiss. I thought he would never be able to outdo last year's Valentine gift (the large capacity washer and dryer), but he did. He's a prince. A prince who leaves his underwear in the middle of the floor, but a prince, nonetheless.